COSTCO HAS 50 copies of
Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray,
Love with signed bookplates
to give away. To enter, print
your name, membership
number, address and
daytime phone number on a
postcard or letter and send it
to: Elizabeth Gilbert, The
Costco Connection, P.O. Box
34088, Seattle, WA 98124-
1088. Or send an e-mail to
giveaway@costco.com, with
“Elizabeth Gilbert” in the
subject line.

No purchase is necessary. Open to
legal residents of the U.S. (except
Puerto Rico) who are age 18 or
older at the time of entry and who
are current Costco members. One
entry per household. Entries must
be received or postmarked by February 1, 2008. Winners will be
randomly selected and notified by
mail on or before March 3, 2008.
The value of the prize is $15. Void
where prohibited. Winners are
responsible for all applicable
federal, state and local taxes. Odds
of winning depend on the number
of eligible entries received.
Employees of Costco or Penguin
and their families are not eligible.

The journey th at

begins with “ ”

By Judi Ketteler

THIRTY-SOMETHING Elizabeth Gilbert seemed In the book, she spends four months in each
to have it all: a handsome husband, a big house place—a year in total. In Rome, she practices the art
in the suburbs and a hot writing career. But she was of pleasure, measured in cups of gelato and platefuls
secretly falling apart, stealing away to weep on the of pasta. She also studies Italian—for no other rea-bathroom floor night after night. The only thing son than to hear the beauty of the language.
she could think to do was something she had never In India, she stays at an ashram, where she
tried before: pray. This response both shocked and chronicles her efforts to meditate and experience
intrigued her. the divine. In Bali, she studies with a
This month’s Book Pick, the ninth-generation medicine man and
wildly successful Eat, Pray, Love: One rediscovers the art of balance, while
Woman’s Search for Everything Across finding unexpected love.

Italy, India, and Indonesia , begins The book reads as a memoir, but
with Gilbert fighting the realizations Gilbert says that Eat, Pray, Love was
that she doesn’t want to be married, written more out of necessity than a
doesn’t want to live in the big subur- desire to explore a new genre. “I had
ban house and is desperately seeking to write this book. It was like the kid
spiritual guidance. One excruciatingly in the back row of school with her
painful divorce later, she’s physically hand up insistently. It wouldn’t be
and emotionally spent. Elizabeth Gilbert still,” she says.

DEBORAH LOPEZ

For Gilbert, a novelist and non- She didn’t know what this quasi-fiction author, there was only one way out of the memoir would wind up looking like, but she knew
pain: writing. “I always used writing as a way to one thing for sure: She would tell the absolute truth,
work through questions I’m either fascinated with no matter what. “I believe you have to do it all the
or confused by—or both,” she tells The Connection. way or not at all,” she says.

Thoroughly confused by her own life, and fascinated As a journalist (she worked for Spin and GQ
with the possibility of a spiritual quest, she decided and has written for many women’s magazines),
to travel to three countries in search of three key Gilbert has always known the importance of truth-things missing in her life: pleasure in Italy, devotion ful reporting. But it was while writing The Last
in India and a balance between the two in Indonesia. American Man (Viking Penguin, 2002), a biography
“I wanted to thoroughly explore one aspect of of modern-day pioneer Eustace Conway, that she
myself set against the backdrop of each country, in a saw how powerful self-truth could be. “I wouldn’t
place that has traditionally done that one thing very have written Eat, Pray, Love the way I did had I not
well,” writes Gilbert in Eat, Pray, Love. That they all written that book,” she says. “He [Conway] was so
begin with“I” was a happy—and fitting—accident. honest and fearless and allowed me to delve the
depths of his personality.”

FRANCE FREEMAN

And though the new book is in many ways a

Pennie’s pick
s piritual quest, tackling the big questions such
a s how a person can have a meaningful expe-
ISAYIFYOUcan’tgoonalife-changing r ience of God, it’s hardly the stuff of monks.
adventurethatinvolvestraveltoamazing ( For example, one of Gilbert’s favorite experi-
destinationsandtheopportunityfordeep e nces in Italy is attending a raucous soccer
soulsearching,thenextbestthingisto m atch where she revels in the lilting sound of
read a book about someone who has. This I taliancursewordsbeingscreamed.)
month’sBookBuyer’sPick,Elizabeth G ilbert is thrilled with the book’s popularity,
Gilbert’sEat,Pray,Love,isthetitleI’m b ut also slightly perplexed. “I feel like it’s gener-
mostinclinedtorecommend. a ted an enthusiasm that goes beyond reason,” she
Afterafailedmarriageandaboutof s ays. Her theory is that people desperately want
depression,GilberttraveledtoItaly,India that mix of worldly pleasure and spiritual fulfill-
and Indonesia. Her adventures in each count ry are m ent,butthesedesiresgetsquelchedinthepro-
recounted in three distinct parts of the book. All of her cessofliving. “Thebook,” shesays, “isjustreminding
stories are told with deep emotion, honesty and humor. themofthethingstheyalwayswanted.” C

PennieClarkIanniciello Eat, Pray, Love is available at most Costco ware-